Ben Shapiro the Jackass

Ben Shapiro's latest article is on Al Gore being accused of being a philanderer by a masseuse.

Now, that "old-fashioned, romantic innocence" has withered away. According to the 73-page police report by a Portland, Ore., masseuse, Gore is not only an attempted adulterer, he's a "crazed sex poodle." And if any of what is laid forth in the report is true, he's also exceptionally weird.

I haven't seen a ton of writing on the Al Gore story, perhaps because most Conservatives are a bit leery of writing that particular phrase - the one where they have to admit that this story may be total bullshit. Doesn't stop young Ben though. He's happy to write his whole article, castigating Gore, praising this masseuse, and complaining that the Media is ignoring this very important story.

In related news, Salon's War Room reported that the Portland Tribune tried for three years to verify this story and couldn't. They apparently went so far as to place an ad on Craig's List, looking for masseuses who might have had a bad experience with a prominent person. So maybe they did look at this story, and, not wanting to admit that it was all heresy, decided to drop it.

So given that the story is unverified and nonsensical why does young Ben want to believe it? Because it fits the narrative that he believes in. All Liberals are hypocritical scumbags.

When the masseuse told her friends that she'd been sexually assaulted by the horny horned-owl hero, they answered her in typical liberal fashion: "suck it up; otherwise, the world's going to be destroyed from global warming."

You have to love people who are so stupid that they think Al Gore's blustering blather about saving the planet means he gets to rape anybody he pleases.

That right there shows that Shapiros hated and disdain for liberals has blinded him to reality. What kind of person would really excuse rape for environmental concerns? Well in Shapiro's mind, that's what a Liberal would do. In my mind, that wouldn't actually happen; it reads like a parody. If further confirmation of this masseuses story come forth, well, we'll have to deal with that. But for the moment it's not that believable.

Does America have Lousy Health Care?

Hard to say. Apparently a bunch of leftists think that America does have lousy health care. This is the point to Dennis Prager's latest article.

The answer is that WHO doesn't assess health care quality; it assesses health care equality, exactly the way any organization on the Left assesses it. And since the world's and America's news media are on the Left, they report a Leftist bogus assessment of American health care as true.

Yep. But this seems to be an example of Prager trusting his audience to condemn the Left without too much reflection. Because Prager certainly doesn't make any sort of positive argument about the benefits of American Health Care. He underlines two serveys that who America having poor healthcare and dismisses them as Leftist, but doesn't feel the need to make the counter argument.

I suppose because he can't; what Prager and his kind believe about the American Health Care system is that it's great if you have the money to avail yourself of it. And if you don't or are on a lower rent insurance package; one in which you are denied coverage regularly, well that's your own problem. Liberals and many moderates on the other hand judge a healthcare system, at least in part, by how accessible it is. We all share the same air, we all get the same germs. So it's in societies best interest to see that medical care is available to all.

There is a case to be made for what Prager belives; I think he's wrong but there is a case for it. But Prager fails to make this case because, essentially, he doesn't have to. Just elevate the dreaded left and trust his audience to make the right decision.

Depressing but Perhaps Accurate

Ted Rall's latest article is about how bad things are for most Americans and how little we seem to be able to do to fix things.

The great mass of Americans works longer hours for less pay. Until, inevitably, they get "laid off." Is there a working- or middle-class American who hasn't lost his job or been close to someone who got fired during the last few years? Even in 2009, when global capitalism entered its final crisis and millions of Americans were losing their homes to the same banks their taxes were paying to bail out, the world's richest people--those with disposable wealth over $30 million--saw their assets soar by 21.5 percent.

Go ahead, little leftie: smash the windows at Starbucks in Seattle. It won't stop transnational corporations from raping the planet and exploiting you. Enjoy your Tea Party, little rightie. It sure is cute, listening to you talk about the wee Constitution. "Your" government and the companies that own "your" leaders have your number.

Yeah kind of depressing; I knew that Obama would be a middle of the roader, but I had hoped for a bit more progress on the economic front. Instead I find myself depending a staunch corprotist from people accusing him of being a wide eyed radical.

News From the Past - June 24, 1930

This is from the Milwaukee Sentinel for Tuesday June 24, 1930.

Plane Restores Eyesight Lost By Mule's Kick

DU QUOIN, Ill., June 23 - (AP) - Walter Wyatt of Du Quoin claims the distinction of being the first to regain the sight of an eye as a result of an airplane flight. Eighteen years ago Wyatt was kicked by a mule and lost the sight of his right eye. Last week he went by plane to Big Sandy, Tenn. On the trip, Wyatt said, the pilot did "a few fancy loops" which restored his vision.
Physicians have pronounced the eye normal but are at a loss to account for the restoration.

Yeah I'm kind of at a loss too, but then I'm not a pilot or an optometrist.

You just have to assume those were some really fancy loops.

We'll Kill Them Until they Love Us

Townhall is going through a soft redesign right now which leads to some oddities - like today's Cal Thomas article being split into two pages, with 95% of the article on the first page and one sentence on the second page. Thomas is writing about McChrystal and trying desperately to split the difference - essentially McChrystal and his aides were right to rip into Obama but it is still against the rules. He then gets to the rules of engagement problem.

To win in Afghanistan, and make such things possible, our "rules of engagement" must change. American casualties have increased because of self-imposed restraints when encountering Taliban who hide behind civilians. You can't win a war by hesitating when the enemy is at a disadvantage. To paraphrase a familiar admonition: grab them by their throats and their hearts and minds will follow.

To clarify, Thomas believes we should kill civilians if it will help us kill Taliban insurgents. And he's kind of a wuss if he can't repeat the quote correctly (it's balls, not throat).

You might wonder how Thomas thinks this killing of civilians is going to work; the truth may be that Thomas doesn't really believe that there are any civilians in that part of the world (he's certainly written his share of Muslim Menace articles). Or he favors the black and white theory that those who are terrorists are going to be terrorists regardless of what we do. I don't believe either of those things, but perhaps Thomas does.

Your Weekly Rush - The Perils of Restraint

Limbaugh is enjoying the McChrystal storyline, and it's inspired him to come up with a way to attack those military leaders who support Obama. Apparently there are corporate generals (who only care about promotion and who will support Obama) and warrior generals (like McChrystal, who won't support Obama). That will come in handy. He then mocks the idea that soldiers should avoid killing civilians.

The medal will be yellow, and this is somebody who gets a medal for not firing their weapon because civilians might be killed. And, of course, this enemy happens to put civilians in front of them at every place they happen to be, even on the battlefield or in a village, town or, or what have you.

I wonder how Limbaugh would feel about cops opening fire on a criminal who took a hostage, killing the hostage in the process. Presumably he'd be ok with it.

Oh - and just in case you forgot what kind of sexist our buddy Rush is.

. . . there is another way to differentiate generals and actually people in general. There are womanly words and there are manly deeds. It is pretty clear which category McChrystal falls into, and also pretty clear which category fits Obama. Womanly words and manly deeds.

Yep. Class act all the way.

John Hawkins vs the Strawman

John Hawkin's latest article is about how dumb moderates are to want bi-partisanship.

Middle-of-the-roaders and people who don't pay a lot of attention to politics have made such a fetish out of bipartisanship that the most partisan political hacks in D.C. will go on and on about "unity" and "working with the other side" even as they lustily plant toe kicks to the other side's groins at every opportunity. To the moderates, this makes little sense. Why can't both sides get together, buy the world a Coke, teach them to sing in perfect harmony, and keep it company....la, la, la, la!

Gosh that does seem silly. Moderats should probably argue instead that both sides find common ground where they can, and work to improve things rather than constantly bickering.

Moderates might also point out that both parties are more interested in defeating their political enemies rather than passing legislation that would improve things.

Of course that is what Moderates actually do, but Hawkins finds it easier to make up some beliefs for Moderates and then mock them. He then points out that we are better off not passing any legislation anyway, which is certainly a conservative position.

Joel Mowbray makes a good point

Joel Mowbray opens his article with this relevant point.

Lost amid the hand-wringing over Israel’s botched flotilla raid last month and speculation about the diplomatic fallout for the Jewish state has been perhaps the most significant development, namely the resurgence of Hamas.

On political and financial life support not even a month ago, Hamas has become the face of the Muslim world’s newest cause célèbre: ending the “humanitarian crisis” in Gaza.

That might indicate to you and to me that perhaps Israel acted unwisely in this particular instance, but of course that's not Mowbray's point. Rather he wants you to know how bad we all are for not remembering how evil Hamas is and how much we must keep grinding down the Palestinian people so that they blame Hamas for their troubles. Basically the Palestinian just need to accept their status as second class citizens and they will be happy.

We'll have to see how that works out.

Compare and Contrast

He assured us, as tens of thousands of gallons of oil belch out of the hole each day, he intends to hold people ... accountable! No mention of the 48-hour deadline -- now come and gone -- that he gave BP to, well, do more.

Poor President Obama -- this isn't a bit like community organizing. He must find it very frustrating.

Larry Elder, "Obama Learns Limits of Government -- Oil Spill Kicks His Hope and Change"

The other day, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs was asked what will happen if the people running BP decline to go along with everything the administration demands of it. "The president," he replied with chilly menace, "has the legal authority to compel them to do so, and if they don't, he will."

As a matter of strict truth, Barack Obama may not have all the legal authority he would need. But punctilious adherence to the law is rarely the hallmark of American presidents.

Steve Chapman, "As the Spill Expands, So Does Presidential Power"

So is the President powerless or overly powerful? Hard to tell.

The Argument for Outlawing Gay Marriage

Maggie Gallaghers latest article is about Gay Marriage and how wrong it is that people argue that homosexuals should be allowed to get married.

For these Americans, gay marriage does not merely expand marriage to more people, it abolishes the historic core conception of marriage and replaces it with a new government-mandated genderless marriage. Gay marriage means that our maleness and femaleness does not matter, our capacity to create new life is irrelevant to the public project of marriage. Henceforth by government decree marriage will mean a commitment of any two people; marriage will become a product of individual desire not rooted in any natural order, not rooted in our history or traditions . . .

I don't know what that means except for I don't like Gay Marriage and therefore it shouldn't exist. And that's the core problem with those who oppose Gay Marriage - their argument never answers the key question; what gives you the right to say Gays can't get married? How does Gay Marriage actually hurt you?

The only answer is that it upsets traditional religious values. That's not enough. That should never be enough. And I don't understand my countrymen who say that that is enough.

Then there's this hilarious bit.

Ted Olson will talk in court this week like a civilized man. But Ted Olson, as much as any one man, is responsible for the idea that there is no real debate to be had about gay marriage, that all the legitimacy, all the arguments, all the good will and good reasons are on his side.

Yeah as opposed to those who are in favor of proposition 8 or who oppose Gay Marriage - they certainly are giving their opponents the benefit of the doubt. You certainly aren't arguing that all the good reasons are opposed to gay marriage.

It would be funny if it weren't so sad that conservatives can argue for treating homosexuals like second class citizens and then act like they are the persecuted ones, merely because people disagree with them.

Rand Paul and Segregation

I don't think Rand Paul is actually a libertarian; he chose to make a keynote address to the poorly named Constitution Party, a dominionist political party. By Dominionist, I mean that they intend to make America into, essentially, a Christian Theocracy. I don't know how you square that with Libertarianism.

That said, even if he were a genuine libertarian who believed that businesses should have the right ot discriminate, he's still kind of an idiot. Michael Lind, over at Salon, has written a piece on what segregation was actually like.

On rereading "Black Like Me" with Rand Paul's controversial comments in mind, I was struck by how very few truly public places there were in the apartheid South. Employers, subdivisions, stores, restaurants, gas stations, hotels -- Rand Paul would have allowed all of these to be segregated to this day because they are privately owned. According to this disingenuous theory, in the segregated South everyone, black or white, should have had a right to work, eat and sleep at the small-town post office or police station, because they were public agencies -- but no right to work, eat or sleep anywhere else.

Yeah, that does seem like a definition designed to protect racism.

Extinction Event

Dougles MacKinnon's latest article is a bit over the top.

Beyond liberal judicial activism and the propagandists for the far-left in the media, our welfare, security, and very existence are being threatened by elected officials from both sides of the aisle who see the rapidly descending blade and purposefully ignore it as they suicidally focus on their own selfish needs.

Were it not for the fact they are about to take the rest of us with them, their extinction would be a welcome relief.

I wonder how many on the right side of the aisle MacKinnon really believes deserve extinction. Probably just a few of the more liberal Republicans.

What's bizarre is how MacKinnon (and many other Republicanoids to be fair) can basically call for the extinction of their political enemies and then act like the aggrieved parties (MacKinnon's larger point is that Abraham Lincoln would be shut down by the PC Police if he were around today). But truthfully we should all be used to that by now; once you can believe that White American males are the most oppressed class in America, you can believe anything.

Hi Jacking Christianity

Our national discourse on religion has basically gotten to the point where both parties/movements are claiming that they represent "real" Christianity. Ken Blackwell and Ken Klukowski have written an article chastising Pelosi for claiming that her politics were inspired by faith.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi has decided to follow President Obama’s lead in claiming that God directs her lawmaking, invoking the Bible as her legislative roadmap. If a conservative Republican did this, it would be the top of the news.

That last line is crybaby nonsense. If a Conservative claims to be motivated by the Bible it's strictly a dog-bites-man story. Many Conservatives can't stop claiming divine motivation for their legislative agenda. They then make fun of her for her for claiming the Bible in totally non-sensical ways.

We don’t recall ever reading, “Thou shalt require every person to buy health insurance” or “Thou shalt oppose charter schools and home-schooling” in the Bible. We’d have to rename the Ten Commandments the Twelve Commandments instead.

Yeah but there's no commandments requiring Christians to oppose health care reform or to support charter schools or home-schooling, and yet many Christians invoke their faith when taking their position. So would Blackwell and Klukowski mock these believers? No because they agree with them.
At heart, Conservative Christians have been arguing for years that Christianity is Conservative and that to be a good Christian one needs to support Conservatism. For Blackwell and Klukowski to pretend that it is the Liberals who are the aggressors in this date takes either total cognative dissonance or their just pretending because that's what their fans want to read.

Its clearly the later by the way. Because they alternate between implying that it's immoral to pretend that Christianity belongs to one party or the other and snidely laughing at the liberals pretending to be Christian.

Everything you need to know about the "Ground Zero" Mosque Protesters

At one point, a portion of the crowd menacingly surrounded two Egyptian men who were speaking Arabic and were thought to be Muslims.

"Go home," several shouted from the crowd.

"Get out," others shouted.

In fact, the two men – Joseph Nassralla and Karam El Masry — were not Muslims at all. They turned out to be Egyptian Coptic Christians who work for a California-based Christian satellite TV station called "The Way." Both said they had come to protest the mosque.

"I'm a Christian," Nassralla shouted to the crowd, his eyes bulging and beads of sweat rolling down his face.

But it was no use. The protesters had become so angry at what they thought were Muslims that New York City police officers had to rush in and pull Nassralla and El Masry to safety.

From a column by Mike Kelly, Columnist for New Jersey.com (which is probably affiliated with a newspaper). Saw this at Salon's War Room initially.

Fear the Intellectual

This is the title of Suzanne Fields latest article. I almost don't need to write anything else, but lets get some substance.

Only yesterday to be called an "intellectual' was a compliment. But intellectuals no longer carry much weight in politics, in cultural salons, book clubs or the wider world of ideas.

. . . George Wallace carried four Southern states in 1968, but he's mostly remembered for his memorable description of snobbish East Coast liberals as "pointy-headed intellectuals" who "can't park a bicycle straight."

Wallace is also remembered for "Segregation Forever," I suppose. But that doesn't fit Field narrative, which is to point out that intellectuals, particularly liberal intellectuals, are pro-Islamism. Apparently we have a soft spot for suicide bombers and anti-semitism.

Fields has really gone off the deep end.

Damning with Faint Praise

David Harsanyi's latest article looks at sadness with what happened to Helen Thomas. Not that he thinks she's a good columnist; he's just upset that she got fired for speaking her mind. So far so good. He even seems to praise Thomas for saying what many clearly believe (which is my problem with his column).

Nevertheless, at this point in her career, the 89-year-old was still a columnist for Hearst newspapers. A columnist offers provocative views. You don't have to like Thomas, and you don't have to read her columns, but having a disdain for Jews in general or Israel in particular is hardly the most offensive thought that's kicking around.

Now again, what Thomas said was that Israel should essentially disband and the Jews living there should go back to Germany, Poland, and the US and wherever else they came from. Very silly point of view.

But what Harsanyi doesn't seem to grasp (presumably because he doesn't want to grasp it) is that Helen Thomas, and others, might be for the Palestinians as opposed to against Israel. Without considering the plight of the Palestinians, the position of Thomas seems inexplicable.

Dennis Prager and the New Dark Age

Dennis Prager's latest article is about the Gaza incident, in which he reviews all the mean things people are saying about Israel and replying that he hopes they are right. Among other things, apparently the media believes Israel should have let it's soldiers get beaten to death rather than defend itself. I personally think that perhaps, the media believes that Israel shouldn't have dropped it's troops on a ship in international waters.

The reason mankind has to hope that the world, its leaders, its newspapers, its so-called human rights organizations and the United Nations are right about Israel is quite simple: If Israel is the decent party in its war with the Palestinian Authority and Hamas -- and nearly all the world's countries, nearly all the world's media and the United Nations are morally wrong -- what hope is there for humanity? If the world's moral compass is that broken, are we not sailing into a dark age?

This goes back to Pragers simplistic black and white way of looking at the world. Either Israel is completely guilty or completely innocent. And since Prager has already determined Israel to be the good guys, he can't look at the Palestinians issues with anything approaching empathy. The Palestinians, to Prager and many other on the right, are nothing but animals, undeserving of even the modest kindnesses that Israel has given them, fully deserving their repression.

Lies and the Lying Liars who Tell Them

From Caroline Glicks lastest article, on the Israeli Raid.

The footage of the IDF's celebrated naval commandos falling prey to an Islamic lynch mob on the deck of the Turkish ship Mavi Marmara on Monday morning serves as a perfect simile for the national mood. The commandos boarded the ship armed with paintball guns expecting to be greeted by hostile, but non-violent humanitarian activists. Instead they were accosted by a murderous mob.

Paintball guns? Not exactly.

The military said in a statement that two activists were later found with pistols taken from Israeli commandos. It accused the activists of opening fire, “as evident by the empty pistol magazines.”

Another soldier said the orders were to neutralize the passengers, not to kill them.

But the forces “had to open fire in order to defend themselves,” the navy commander, Vice Adm. Eliezer Marom, said at a news conference in Tel Aviv, adding, “Their lives were at risk.”

At least seven soldiers were wounded, one of them seriously. The military said that some suffered gunshot wounds; at least one had been stabbed.

Yeah, that doesn't sound like paintball guns, does it?

Not to mention the dishonesty of framing the decision of Israel to board a civilian ship, an action which lead to the deaths of 9 activists and no Israeli soldiers, as an aggressive act on the part of the activists is a bit disingenuous.

The Left and Islam; peas in a pod

I wonder if Andrew C. McCarthy has sent a thank you card to the organizers of the Gaza Flotilla. You see he's written a book about how the Left and Islam (not radical Islam or Islamist, just Islam) are two peas in the freedom denying pod. Diana West interviewed him in her latest article.

For all their disagreements on matters like women's rights, gay rights and abortion, Islam and the Left are in harmony on big-picture matters: They are authoritarian, totalitarian in the sense of wanting to control all aspects of human existence, virulently anti-capitalist, and regard the individual as existing merely to serve the collective.

Part of me thinks there's little point in pointing out the nonsense on display here. But it is sort of my job.

1. Practitioners of Islam exist peacefully and are contributing citizens in all western societies including our own. Condemning the religion as some sort of fifth column, as McCarthy does, is extraordinarily dishonest.

2. Leftists do not actually want to control all aspects of human existence; they simply want to use the power of the Government to prevent actions that they consider destructive to society as a whole. Kind of like how many Conservatives would like to use the power of the Government to push their anti-homosexual agenda.

3. It is just as valid to suggest that conservatives wish to keep the individuals weak to support another collective - i.e. the corporation. Conservatives constantly take steps to keep individuals weak and divided so that they are necessarily in thrall to Corporations.

Still, McCarthys thesis certainly would justify actions like boarding a flotilla in international waters and shooting the people on board. It would probably justify far worse actions; forced conversion for example.

Contrasting Views

Who is responsible for this serious downward spiral in the Mideast? Who else? When the Obama administration spends its first year “extending an open hand” to the murderous mullahs in Tehran, and when it fails to do anything meaningful to stop Iran’s march to nuclear weapons, when the administration stiff-arms the Israelis, and treats Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu like a pariah for building apartments for Jews in the capital of the Jewish state, the wolves of jihad gather. They scent blood. Will this be one more chapter in the lamentable story of how weak and irresolute leadership leads us into war?

We must pray it doesn’t happen.

Ken Blackwell, "Will Our Peace Prizewinner Lead Us Into a New War?"

What we witnessed in the early hours of Monday morning was symptomatic of a new degree of fatigue in Israeli governing circles. The fact that both the political and the military authorities could sign off on such an irresponsible operation suggests that the leadership of the country has given up what it has concluded is ultimately a Sisyphean attempt to accommodate world opinion. Isolation is no longer a threat to be fought, their thinking seems to go, because Israel is terminally isolated. What remains is to concentrate exclusively on what is best for Israel's survival, shedding any regard for the opinion of others.

. . . Israel's fatigue and deep sense of ostracism is, to say the least, unhealthy.

Ronen Bergman, as quoted by Joe Conason.

I find the latter more plausible, but presumably Ken Blackwell would read that as just more evidence that we should be behind Israel, no matter how recklessly they act.

Clash of Civilizations

It is to be expected that the American Right Wing and the Political Class of both persuasions will support Israel and condemn Palestine no matter the situation. Cal Thomas's latest article is certainly no surprise in this regard. He neglects to mention that the ship was in international waters when it was boarded, and he describes them as akin to the mafia; pretending to be charitable, while really out to destroy Israel. Not very surprising all things considered.

Of course, Thomas then makes this stirring call.

Again, we've seen this scenario before and surely will see it again, and again, and again, unless and until the world wakes up to the clash of civilizations too many want to ignore, hoping it will go away. It won't until one civilization crushes the other.

By which Thomas means, presumably, the West crushes the Islamic World. War without end, indeed. And as I've noted before, Palestine and the Palestinians have been crushed by almost every definition of the term. The remaining possibility is, well, genocide; but let's hope that's not what Thomas is calling for.

1964 vs. 2010

This is, of course, about Rand Paul. Joseph C. Phillips has written an interesting article about Rand Paul's mistake, but spends most of the article agreeing with Paul.

The truth is that Paul’s argument has more merit than the mushy multi-culturalism preached on the left. In a free market, private business owners should have the right to do business with whomever they want.

So that sounds like he generally agrees with Paul, and he clearly does. But he does point out that 1964 was a different time.

In 1964 conservatives sought to protect the Constitution even as it was being torn to shreds. Conservatives cautioned against a dangerous expanse of governmental power even as those with abhorrent and anti-constitutional views used the power of government to usurp the freedoms of a portion of the citizenry. Conservatives reasoned that lasting transformation could only be had through changing hearts; pubic pressure could be brought to bear and in time white folks would remit and blacks would finally enjoy equality and freedom.

Fair enough - I could point out that many Southern Conservatives (then members of the Democratic Party) were racist and thought that keeping blacks down was proper.

Ultimately, Rand Paul’s argument fails exactly where conservatism failed. It is not up to some men to dictate to other men when they shall enjoy their God-given rights. To believe that boycotts and other forms of public pressure were by themselves going to break down the racial barriers in American society is to ignore the deafening clash of the cleanliness of theory meeting head-on with the filth of reality. Theory says that government must be limited to certain specific duties and must be vigorous in fulfilling those duties. The reality is that even a limited government must be powerful enough to perform its charge. Moreover, those within the government must have the political will to act quickly and decisively when the freedoms of any citizen are threatened.

This part I find unpersuasive. Rand seems to agree that businesses have the right to discriminate, but he feels that the government should have the power to keep blacks from being discriminated against. That doesn't make any sense. He also specifically references the out of control power of the federal government that Conservatives were concerned about - but he seems equally concerned about. So are left with this formulation.

1. Businesses have the right to discriminate.
2. Government is too powerful, and should not have the ability regulate businesses they way they have.
3. Blacks and other minorities should have access to the same Businesses as the majority.
4. The Government should act quickly and decisively to preserve those rights.

Those don't really line up. I suspect that Phillips real point is that of course Rand was right, but you shouldn't say it.